HomeLane Raises Rs 24 Crores from BCCL’s Brand Capital

After raising $10 million last December, HomeLane.com, India’s leading online home interiors brand today announced that it has raised fresh Rs 24 Crores from Brand Capital, the strategic investment arm of the media giant Bennett, Coleman and Co. Ltd (the Times Group) in a fresh round of funding. The startup will deploy the funds to fuel expansion and brand strengthening to attract customers. HomeLane counts Accel Partners, Sequoia Capital, Baring PE, Aarin Capital, GrowthStory & RB Investments as it’s investors.

Srikanth Iyer, co-founder and CEO of HomeLane.com said, “With HomeLane, our goal is to offer our customers a smoother and more streamlined home designing experience enabled by technology. We have been working towards offering Indian homebuyers an unbeatable combination of transparency and predictability, which is unheard of in this largely unorganized business. We are scaling up well and our association with Brand Capital will help us further enhance our brand and channelize our national expansion plans.”

Homelane operates in Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Delhi-NCR. The company will be doubling the number of experience centers in existing markets by end of this year and is looking to achieve Rs 200 crore in run-rate by March 2019.

Sam Subramaniam, CEO, Brand Capital, said, "Homelane addresses a key gap and need in the market for home buyers in a seamless and efficient way. The continued growth in and attraction to private home ownership will propel Homelane's market strongly over the coming decade. Brand Capital is proud to be partnered with Homelane and it's impressive investor group."

HomeLane.com is a pioneer in the organized online home furnishing market and offers an industry-first 45-day delivery guarantee for fit-outs. HomeLane’s value proposition is solving the interior design problem with technology and predictable timelines.

Founded in 2014 by Rama Harinath, Srikanth Iyer and Vivek Parasuram, HomeLane.com is India’s #1 online provider of home fit-out solutions. With presence in Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai and NCR, HomeLane.com has established itself as a key enabler for homeowners in furnishing their dream home. HomeLane.com already delivered 2500 projects since inception

HomeLane Raises Rs 24 Crores from BCCL’s Brand Capital

After raising $10 million last December, HomeLane.com, India’s leading online home interiors brand today announced that it has raised fresh Rs 24 Crores from Brand Capital, the strategic investment arm of the media giant Bennett, Coleman and Co. Ltd (the Times Group) in a fresh round of funding. The startup will deploy the funds to fuel expansion and brand strengthening to attract customers. HomeLane counts Accel Partners, Sequoia Capital, Baring PE, Aarin Capital, GrowthStory & RB Investments as it’s investors.

Srikanth Iyer, co-founder and CEO of HomeLane.com said, “With HomeLane, our goal is to offer our customers a smoother and more streamlined home designing experience enabled by technology. We have been working towards offering Indian homebuyers an unbeatable combination of transparency and predictability, which is unheard of in this largely unorganized business. We are scaling up well and our association with Brand Capital will help us further enhance our brand and channelize our national expansion plans.”

Homelane operates in Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Delhi-NCR. The company will be doubling the number of experience centers in existing markets by end of this year and is looking to achieve Rs 200 crore in run-rate by March 2019.

Sam Subramaniam, CEO, Brand Capital, said, "Homelane addresses a key gap and need in the market for home buyers in a seamless and efficient way. The continued growth in and attraction to private home ownership will propel Homelane's market strongly over the coming decade. Brand Capital is proud to be partnered with Homelane and it's impressive investor group."

HomeLane.com is a pioneer in the organized online home furnishing market and offers an industry-first 45-day delivery guarantee for fit-outs. HomeLane’s value proposition is solving the interior design problem with technology and predictable timelines.

Founded in 2014 by Rama Harinath, Srikanth Iyer and Vivek Parasuram, HomeLane.com is India’s #1 online provider of home fit-out solutions. With presence in Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai and NCR, HomeLane.com has established itself as a key enabler for homeowners in furnishing their dream home. HomeLane.com already delivered 2500 projects since inception

Cityfurnish Raises Funding From Times Group

Gurgaon-based furniture rental start-up Cityfurnish.com has raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Brand Capital, the investment arm of media conglomerate Bennett, Coleman and Co. Ltd. (BCCL). Cityfurnish plans to advertise its brand and offerings through various media publications of Bennett, Coleman & Co Ltd, which operates as Times Group. The partnership is a significant step in propelling the brand to newer heights as it seeks to increase its footprint to 6 metro and tier one cities and to become a sought after brand in premium lifestyle products rental space. This round also saw the participation of existing investors of Cityfurnish further strengthening their confidence in Cityfurnish.

The startup is already operating in Gurgaon, Delhi and Bangalore and now planning to launch its services in Pune and Mumbai soon. Cityfurnish aims to revolutionise the rental industry in India by making renting affordable and easy. With the advent of shared economy and rise in dislocation among the millennials, renting is set to increase and Cityfurnish wants to capture this market. Announcing the investment received, Neerav Jain, Founding Director of Cityfurnish said, "We are happy and excited about our new association with Times Group. We intend to leverage their ability to build brands through their prestigious advertising channels. We foresee a new elevated status for our brand, which shall help us expand faster in new cities."

The rental market in India is still in a nascent stage with unorganised vendors and payment networks aplenty. With the entry of start-ups like Cityfurnish, this is set to change. Cityfurnish's focus is on creating a rental ecosystem that would enable the highly mobile urban population to access premium lifestyle products at easy and affordable rentals.

Currently, Cityfurnish offers a variety of home furniture and furnishing on affordable monthly rental plans. It has also launched a new category of exercise equipment recently. "We want to become a one-stop solution for premium lifestyle products on rent," said Neerav Jain, founder of Cityfurnish.

iDreamCareer.com Gets Pre-Series A Funding from Times Group’s Brand Capital

[caption id="attachment_105629" align="alignnone" width="701"] iDreamCareer.com's Team[/caption]

Delhi based career planning ed-tech startup, iDreamCareer.com has raised an undisclosed sum as pre-series A funding from The Times of India publisher BCCL’s (Bennett, Coleman & Co Ltd's) strategic investment arm, Brand Capital.

Founded in late 2013 by Ayush Bansal & Pravesh Dudani, iDreamCareer.com has grown to become India’s leading EdTech brand in the space of career & higher education planning. It provides scientific and unbiased career guidance to high school & college students. Due to the dynamic changes, that India has seen in the past couple of years, the students of today are now being exposed to numerous career options, right from the time they graduate high school. Given this scenario, a product like iDreemCareer proves to be a perfect match for the educational and career counselling needs of today. The personalized program offered, handholds students over a period of 2-3 years and helps them take a successful transition from high school to college. Its program cover the entire transition which start from career exploration, identifying student’s potential, finding the right career fit ,stream selection to ultimately completing it with the college admission & selection process.

Since its inception in 2013, iDreamCareer has been on an upward trajectory and has consistently shown growth par excellence. Prior to raising the current Pre-series A round of funding, the company had raised its seed round in mid-2014 from Mr G.K Sinha and subsequently raised its angel round in mid-2015 from ah! Ventures with investors Mohit Satyanand, Vivek Joshi, Indian Design Group & others participating in the deal.

Post its last round of funding in August, 2015, iDreamCareer has changed its targeting proposition and has made a complete transition to a B2C model. As part of its next growth phase iDreamCareer is planning to raise around $5 million as part its Series A round by the end of this year. The new funds shall be utilized to expand its presence in 15 cities in India & Middle East and to develop complementing products in the form of assessment and mentoring tools.